From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
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We hope you enjoyed this pause in the action. Please have a great rest of your day. Just don’t roll a ten or you’ll have to go directly to jail.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Thursday, October 20, 2016
Note: Campaign insiders say Trump plans major pivot on November 9th. Film at 11.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til Bad Santa 2 opens: 34
Days 'til the National Weather Festival in Norman, Oklahoma: 16
Likely Georgia voters who plan to vote for Clinton and Trump, respectively, according to the latest SurveyMonkey-WaPost poll: 45%, 41%
Percent of home sales over the past year that have gone to first-time buyers, higher than original estimates, according to Zillow: 47%
Number of state legislative chambers, out of 99, currently controlled by Republicans: 69
Net chamber pickups expected for Democrats on November 8th, according to the DLCC: 8-12
Percent of Republicans who thought ACORN stole the 2008 election for Obama, according to PPP: 52%
MLB Championship Playoffs
» LA Dodgers are tied with the Chicago Cubs 2 games to 2
» Cleveland Indians beat the Toronto Blue Jays 4 games to 1, and they’re headed to the World Series.
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Your Thursday Molly Ivins Moment:
Without fear of contradiction, I can say that George W. Bush has turned out to be a divider, not a uniter, for the past four years.
Sheesh, if we get any madder at each other there will be fisticuffs, brethren, I say fisticuffs.
Liberals, normally gentle as little kittens---usually you can go right up to 'em and touch their soft, curly fur, they don't mind a bit – are in an alarming state of righteous anger. This time, they devoutly believe, jackbooted fascism is just around the corner. Not only do they think the Bill of Rights is being quietly dismantled, they are sentient enough to notice that our reputation around the world has gone from the instant support of Sept. 11 to disgust and fear.
Meanwhile, many evangelical Christians are convinced gay marriage is upon us and will be the end of civilization. How they convinced themselves George W. Bush is the Lord's anointed is beyond me. I've known him since high school and watched him closely as a public official for 10 years, and I have yet to see the first sign of it.
---October 2004
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Up and over…
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CHEERS to waving goodbye to the circus caboose. Phew! Free at last! Debate #3 is over and, as expected, Hillary Clinton maintained her poise and polish, while Donald Trump went for broke and provided enough crazy fodder for Alec Baldwin to do a hundred SNL sketches. If you missed it, go check out the (once again) amazing live-blogging by the front pagers downstream for the best summary. Now all that's left between now and November 8 is the daily release of polls, the tweets about Trump's latest rantings, and awesome speech snippets from Hillary and her surrogates as they steam toward their likely blowout. A few notes from my now-bloodied fingertips as the contest progressed:
» Before the event, Mike Pence complained during a Q&A with Chris Matthews about how much harsher the media are to Trump. Yeah, Mike, that happens when your guy is a psychotic James Bond villain.
» Sarah Palin was apparently there last night. Arizonans should remember that John McCain plucked her from the wild and unleashed her on America, thus fertilizing the Trump movement…and then vote the doddering fool out.
» Now we know: the "shackled" Trump is loud, rude, dishonest and incompetent. The "unshackled" Trump is loud, rude, dishonest and incompetent. Boy, what a great strategic decision it was to turn him loose!
» Hillary stood up for our military and intelligence agencies and super-glued Trump to Putin's hip in one answer. Impressive. Almost as impressive as her rhetorical superiority on women's health, the economy, immigration, the Supreme Court and guns.
» Once again, nothing on climate change. Or LGBT rights. The forgotten issues of the campaign.
» In all 3 debates it almost seemed like Trump's blood sugar went kablooey or something right at the 30 minute mark. That seems to be his wall before he gets bored or antsy or….something. But we need a 24/7 president, not a 30-minute one.
» Trump called Clinton a “nasty woman.” Now we know why Putin is so scared of her.
» The jaw-dropper of the night summed up in the Portland Press Herald's huge above-the-fold headline this morning: "Trump Won’t Say If He'll Accept Election Results." I can just see him at 3am November 9th, hours after the election is called for Hillary in a landslide, standing at a lectern bellowing to an empty room about how it was all rigged: "You haven't heard the last of me! I'll show you!" In fact, it will be the last we hear of him and he won’t show us.
» Who won? CNN's poll says Hillary: 52 to 39.
And finally, I make this fearless prediction: in 2020 the debates will be preceded by limousiness disengorging celebrity arrivals onto a red carpet to be interviewed by Ryan Seacrest and aired live on E! What can I say? It’s a gift.
CHEERS and JEERS to the end of a really long trip. Big day yesterday for the European Space Agency, which was hoping for two big wins: setting its TGO satellite into Mars's orbit, and then delicately dropping its Schiaparelli probe onto the Martian surface. The first part was successful:
Unfortunately, they lost contact with the probe, which means it could've been damaged during the descent, or simply failed to "wake up" once it plopped on the Martian surface. We'll find out more this morning via EAS's livestream and Twitter feed. Meanwhile, the orbiter has started repeating a message to the planet programmed by an ESA technician: "Greetings Mars…we are from Earth…we come in peace…my boss sucks…makes me work during my lunch hour…total brown-noser to the senior administrator." Rather, I should say, as of this morning: "ex"-technician.
CHEERS to the Birthday Bab. Today is Birth of the Bab day, honoring the founder of the Babi religion, forerunner to Baha'u'llah and the Baha'i faith. According to tradition, no work is to be done on this day. Great...now they tell me, after I've spent the last hour tying my work yakskins on.
JEERS to anti-climactic moments. The universe gasped in anticipation Tuesday night when Michael Moore announced a major "October surprise"---a new movie! Holy cow, could Michael Moore in TrumpLand be the kind of must-see indictment of Tiny Hands McPussygrabber that Fahrenheit 9/11 was for George W. Bush? Apparently not, says Neil Genzlinger of The New York Times:
Filmed over two nights early this month in Wilmington, Ohio, the movie captures a live stage performance by Mr. Moore in a town that leans heavily Trump (though that was not necessarily true of the audience he performed for). …
He begins with some self-deprecating jokes about liberals (he was a Bernie Sanders supporter in the Democratic primaries), then throws in some mild jabs at Mr. Trump, but nothing that would cause anyone to bolt from the room or shout him down. […]
Mr. Moore has basically made an earnest but not very entertaining pro-Clinton campaign film, occasionally funny, momentarily heartfelt when he takes up the subject of universal health care and the lives lost for lack of it. … [But] it’s surprising to hear someone extolling a candidate’s virtues rather than just harping on what’s wrong with the opponent---it’s surprising to hear, in other words, why we should elect someone rather than why we shouldn’t.
But compared to anything Dinesh D'Souza has churned out, it's freakin' Citizen Kane.
CHEERS to 86 decent years---and 4 that really sucked. Herbert Hoover got some company recently in the form of a certain George W. Bush, who now joins him on the short list of worst presidents ever. But Hoover was quite the humanitarian before his disastrous (and, boy howdy, do we mean disastrous!) one term as president...and he was quite the competent humanitarian for 30 years after. But his time ran out when he kicked the bucket on this date in 1964 at the age of 90. Oh, and speaking of speaking of #31 and #43 in the same breath, there actually was someone who roamed the planet named George W. Hoover. Poor soul.
CHEERS to today's edition of Yeah, I Know the Feeling. Courtesy of Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, speaking about the late Antonin Scalia:
“There are things he’s said on the bench where if I had a baseball bat, I might have used it,” she said.
This has been today's edition of Yeah, I Know the Feeling.
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Ten years ago in C&J: October 20, 2006
CHEERS to everyday satisfying verdicts. Wal-Mart got stung by a state jury last Thursday for breaking state labor laws---y'know, unreasonable looney liberal concepts like rest breaks and getting paid for all the hours you work. Says Chris Kofinis, a spokesman for WakeUpWalMart.com: "I think it reinforces that this company's sweatshop mindset is a serious problem, both legally and morally." Which reminds me: don't forget that Barbie's Dream Mariana Islands Slave Factory is on sale for just $23.97. Aisle twelve.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to foresight. Can you imagine being able to go back 30 years and gobble up the very first internet domain names like a kid in a candy store? This would've been your only competition for URLs back then:
Rank Create date Domain name
1. 15-Mar-1985 SYMBOLICS.COM
2. 24-Apr-1985 BBN.COM
3. 24-May-1985 THINK.COM
4. 11-Jul-1985 MCC.COM
5. 30-Sep-1985 DEC.COM
6. 07-Nov-1985 NORTHROP.COM
7. 09-Jan-1986 XEROX.COM
8. 17-Jan-1986 SRI.COM
9. 03-Mar-1986 HP.COM
10. 05-Mar-1986 BELLCORE.COM
Mommy, hindsight hurts.
Have a nice Thursday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
"I'd advise Bill in Portland Maine to stop whining and go try and skim the kiddie pool."
---President Obama
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